This was a brilliant read. As soon as I started reading this book I just knew I was going to love it. Highly recommended

This is the second of the Samuel Bjork books featuring Munch and Kruger although can be read as a standalone (if you get the chance, do read the first one!).

This is equally as dark and as disturbing but is definitely worth a read especially with how the author manages to keep the reader interested as there are a lot of new characters to keep up with.

Although some may find the storyline quite disturbing, it is worth persevering with as I enjoyed it.

Recommended!

This is book 2 in Holger Munch & Mia Kruger series, but can be read as a standalone. The first book is I'm Travelling Alone.

hen a young woman is found dead, the police are quick to respond. But what they find at the murder site is unexpected. The body is posed, the scene meticulously set. And there is almost no forensic evidence to be found.


Detective Mia Krüger is a woman on the edge - she has been signed off work pending psychological assessment. But her boss has less regard for the rules than he should. Desperate to get Mia back in the office, Holger Munch offers her an unofficial deal.


But the usually brilliant Mia is struggling and the team are unable to close the case. Until a young hacker uncovers something that forces the team to confront the scope of the murderer’s plans and face the possibility that he may already be on the hunt for a second victim.

The second book of a series - not as good as the first. I got tired of it and wanted to skip chunks as it was boring me and was unbelieveable.

This book was set to the background of Norway, and the descriptions of the scenery made me wish I was there my self. The book features a kick-arse detective lady named Mia Kruger, and I enjoyed her interactions with her colleagues and suspects as she interviewed them. The book was enthralling and kept me guessing until the end. Recommended.

Typical Nordic thriller, with a lot of cold, heavy atmospheres, very much alcohol and mental discomfort. As always happens with genre fiction from those countries, the inner turmoil of the characters is not only described, but becomes an integral part of the discovery of the mystery process. In other words, the inner torment of the protagonists isn't of distubance to the investigations but becomes the engine of them. Impeccable until the final, which I found a bit too hasty and confused.
Thank Transworld Publishers and Netgalley for giving me a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

I was a massive fan of I'm Travelling Alone - the characters, the writing, the storyline - all perfect. I had very high expectations for The Owl Always Hunts at Night and sadly they weren't quite met. Don't get me wrong - this is still an excellent thriller. I supposed because the first book left such a huge impression I expected the follow-up to pick up at the same pace and it didn't.

However - once it did pick up I put everything else aside to finish it. It definitely grabs your attention but just took a little while to get there this time. Would I recommend it? Absolutely! However I would start with I'm Travelling Alone if you haven't read that already.

I would like to thank Random House UK and NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read ‘The Owl Always Hunts At Night’ by Samuel Bjork in exchange for my honest and unbiased review.
This is the second book by Samuel Bjork featuring Homicide Investigator Holger Munch and his colleague Mia Kruger, a worthy successor to ‘I’m Travelling Alone’. The story begins with a botanist in a forest finding the body of a naked girl surrounded by feathers and candles and with a white lily in her mouth. Munch is called in to investigate and gets his colleague Mia Kruger to assist unofficially.
I found the story flowed well making it easy to read. The plot was intriguing and the characters interesting although I couldn’t understand why, in the middle of an investigation, Munch never answered texts or phone calls. I’ve enjoyed reading both books and look forward to a third.

This is my first book from Samuel Bjork and it won't be my last. This is a sick, disturbing story from a nordic writer but it was very entertaining, original and I liked it so much I read it in two days, I liked the two characters Munch and Kruger not your typical team , but I thought they worked very well together. More please

Thoroughly enjoyed this latest book with detectives Holgar and Mia. In another deeply disturbing series of murders, we learn alot more about the main protagonists as their characters develop further and become even more likeable.

When a young woman is found dead, what they find at the scene is unexpected. The body is posed, the scene laboriously set. And there is almost no forensic evidence to be found. Enter Holgar and Mia who pick through the clues, links and evidence to unravel the mystery surrounding what is set to be a series of bizarre murders.

There are lots of twists and turns and the book concludes well. I really enjoyed this latest book and look forward to the next installment!

My thanks to Netgalley for an ARC in return for an honest review/

Early autumn and the Norwegian days are cold and the nights drawing in. In the midst of a wood the body of a young girl is found, she is naked, thin and posed in a pentangle, nestled on a bed of feathers. The circumstances are so bizarre that the crack investigative team led by Holger Munch are called in. Munch's team discover that the girl had been held for three months in an underground prison and forced to perform for a live feed. Investigator Mia is still battling her own demons but her instinct for a case is as sharp as ever.

I really enjoyed Bjork's first book 'I'm Travelling Alone' and so looked forward to this one and was not disappointed. Bjork writes complex, dark and detailed Scandic-Crime that really packs a punch. I find the characters of the team fascinating, no-one is straightforward but no-one is so maverick as to be unbelievable, and translation is crisp and well-written.

This was a fantastic read. Took a while to get a handle on all the characters as there were so many but once you figure it all out it's not so bad.
The story is centred around the discovery of a teenage girl who has been murdered possibly with some connection to rituals or a cult.
This book is quite hard to read in parts which I think shows how very well written it is.
The main charachters Mia and Holker are very easy to warm to.
This is one of those books that is very difficult to review as the least little thing will give too much away. Suffice to say it's an edge of your seat cracking read that gives you a ball of anxiety right in the pit of your stomach. Works highly recommend this book

This book wasn’t what I expected it to be when I first picked it up. The first chapter tells a story from years ago when some of the characters were younger, as the book progressed, my thoughts kept returning to this first chapter as I tried to figure out what had happened. I did not figure it out, until the twists told us so!! I like a book where I cannot guess the twists, this is a winning book for me. However, the very strange and different thing about this book for me was that I didn’t have a clue who the culprit was for the majority of the book, and I am always suspicious of practically everyone, but not in this tale. Honestly, it confused me a bit. This is one of the reasons that enjoyed buddy reading this so much, so that at the end of each reading marathon, I would check in with Irena and see what she thought.

This is the first book that I have read that is based in Norway, and the way the characters describe it, it sounds so cold and uninviting! But having a friend who is Norwegian I know that there are very beautiful parts of Norway, and I can only deduce that the negative way the characters spoke of the country (more so the weather) was part of her state of mind.

There are a lot of different elements to this story, a lot of characters and a lot of divided off stories. It made me wonder how it was all going to link up, but link up it did and it did it very well. It was a book that I had to concentrate on because of the many characters, but because of this I got very involved in the story and it completely wrapped me up for the week I was reading it. I haven’t ever read a book like this before, with very strange ideas and a total mix of characters. The Author even mentioned Anonymous and Black Hackers (which I hadn’t heard of before, but I know of now after reading this).

Overall the book was gripping, thought provoking and a very different kind of thriller.

This is the second book featuring Mia Kruger and Holger Munch. Another grisly crime scene that the pair are asked to investigate. The victim here is a young girl left naked and carefully posed in a pentagon with feathers and a lily in her mouth. The girl lived in a residential home with other troubled teens.
Mia is still struggling to come to terms with the death of her twin sister, she is extremely intuitive but on a self destruct path which concerns her superiors.

Holger is also troubled in this book, coming to terms with his ex wifes impending marriage.

This book is well written with lots of twists and interesting characters and I look forward to the next installment

This is dark and bleak Nordic noir set in Norway. It is the second in the Holger Munch and Mia Kruger series and the first I have read. It works reasonably well as a standalone. It begins with Tom Petterson, a botanist, discovering the dead body of a emaciated teenager. There are signs of rituals attached to the murder with the presence of a pentagon, owl feathers, candles, wig, a horse head tattoo and a flower in the mouth. Holger Munch is at his ex wife's home and reeling from the news that she is to be married when he is called out to the scene. After grovelling to his superior, he manages to get the suspended Mia Kruger working on the investigating team. Mia is not in a great place, still mourning the loss of her sister, Sigrid, and in the midst of contemplating suicide. The case helps her refocus her attention away from her personal issues for a while.

This is a case with its roots in the past. The team follow several threads to the case that lead to a children's home housed within a plant nursery. The various people and children are investigated. In the meantime, Gabriel Mork, a IT and technology expert, has a friend from his past, Skunk. who draws the team's attention to a disturbing and horrific video on the dark web featuring the dead girl. The police team have their own problems such as Jon 'Curry' Larsen drinking and relationship problems. Miriam Munch, Holger's daughter, is experiencing angst that has her engaging in a extra-marital affair and animal liberation activity. There are a number of twists before the shocking finale.

What strikes me is the preponderance of mental health issues that afflict a number of characters in the story. Mia, whilst seeing a therapist, has no intention of being helped or even acknowledging that she has a deep rooted problem. She resents any overtures of help offered. Holger is unable to move on from the disintegration of his marriage that occurred years ago. The killer whilst ostensibly being smart and intelligent is mentally disturbed and disturbing. And there are a number of other characters in the novel experiencing mental health issues. I enjoyed reading this novel but there needs to be character development in Holger and Mia for me to pursue this series further. Many thanks to Random House Transworld for an ARC.

This is the sequel to his first novel, I’m Travelling Alone, featuring detectives Munch and Kruger. This is a tale that is as dark and disturbing as the cold, unforgiving, winter landscape of Norway. The Owl is a serial killer that the Homicide Unit must apprehend while most of the detectives are wrestling with their own personal demons. It’s a crime thriller which tells both a unique and imaginative story and with an ending that is impossible to predict, it kept me riveted to the very end.

Travelling Alone with an owl on the hunt at night? Even the titles of these novels are a bit scary. This is a lot darker than the first novel but follows on well although I'm pleased I read the first one before starting this one as it does explain a lot of the underlying issues of the characters.

The crime scene at the start is grim and there's a sense of hopelessness which pervades the whole investigation - no DNA or forensic evidence, the unsettling nature of the crime, the police officers who have more than their fair share of issues to deal with. Heavy stuff some of it but the investigation is never going to be easy anyway is it.
There are some very dark issues here in this book and some of them have created disturbing images in my head that will linger for some time. Having said that it's proof that the novel has immersed me into its dark and twisted pages. The darkness does get very heavy at times but then a novel which touches on mental issues, a home for troubled children and ritual deaths is not going to be happy is it?

The chilling nature of Norwegian claustrophobia is more than well done. I just need to get beside a fire and warm myself up now.

This book wasnt for me. I found it very hard to get into and very difficult to read. I didnt connect or feel anything for any of the characters.

I would like to thank Netgalley and Random House UK, Transworld Publishing for an advance copy of The Owl Always Hunts At Night, the second in the Munch & Krüger series of Norwegian police procedurals.

Mia Krüger is off work due to her precarious mental health and Holger Munch is awkwardly celebrating his granddaughter's birthday at his ex-wife's house when a body is found. There is no doubt that it is murder, and a weird one to boot, given the unusual posing of the body and the artefacts found at the scene. Munch pulls some strings to get Mia on the case, hoping to use her brilliance to get a result.

I have not yet read I'm Travelling Alone so I have no reference point for this series. This is a fairly straightforward police procedural, teenage girl dead, find killer, with blind alleys and red herrings. There is no real twist, just a narrowing of options. The dénouement is a bit coincidental but works well.

I like the writing style of the novel which is open, warm and inviting so I felt at home in it from the first pages. This is just as well because the execution is a bit disjointed. There are flashbacks to unnamed boys' childhoods and different points of view in different chapters so there is no continuous narrative thread. This not actually as much of an issue as it can be in other novels as the narrative still flows and it is easy to keep track.

I'm not so sure about the characters. Holger Munch is the boss and he is lonely, grumpy, constantly tired and still, after 10 years, hankering after his soon to be re-married ex-wife. He also overbuys for his granddaughter (that struck a chord!). He is well drawn and realistic. Supposedly brilliant, Mia Krüger's alcohol and prescription pill abuse and her suicidal feelings, lead her to make too many mistakes. She shouldn't be working and Munch encouraging and allowing it calls his judgement into question. I found her an extremely annoying character. The other team members are not fleshed out and it would be interesting to see more of them in future novels.

I enjoyed The Owl Always Hunts At Night so I have no hesitation in recommending it as a good read.

I read this straight after finishing I'm Travelling Alone, another gripping read, the detective's daughter is pretty unlucky though.. Looking forward to more in this series.